Unstoppable force to immovable object
Sabi Hussain
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, December 7
AB de Villiers owns the record for the fastest fifty (16 balls), century (31 balls) and 150 (64 balls) in One-day cricket. He is also the fastest man to score 8,000 ODI runs, and the only player in the world to average more than 50 at a strike rate of more than 100 in the 50-over format.
In short, he’s the best batsman in the limited-overs cricket. In the 2015 World Cup, he scored 482 runs in seven innings at an average of 96.4 and a strike rate of 144.31. He averages 54.21 in ODIs and hasn’t averaged less than 50 since 2008.
Despite being the unstoppable force in the limited-overs cricket, the South African showed in the last two days that, if he chooses, he could also be the immovable object in Test cricket. On the final two days of the Delhi Test, he dropped anchor and played like a monk, divorcing aggression for patience, extravagance for longevity. His trademark slog sweeps and reverse sweeps made way for a dead bat, and played with soft hands to try and script what would have been a fairytale escape for the South Africans.
For one of the cleanest hitters in world cricket, the dour approach he showed for almost four sessions at the deteriorating Ferozeshah Kotla surface added a new dimension to his ever growing legend. Shedding his attacking instinct, he spent nearly six hours at the crease (354 minutes), faced 297 balls and took blow after blow to salvage the battered and bruised pride of the Proteas on their longest tour of India, which resulted in an anti-climax (0-3 Test series loss) after the high of T20 and ODI series win.
Fight to the last
Set an improbable 481-run target, de Villiers and Amla had resisted the Indian attack for 29.2 overs on the penultimate day. And when they came out to bat on the final morning, they had full 90 overs to play to avoid the defeat. However, in the 13th over the day, Ravindra Jadeja broke through the stubborn defence of Amla (25 off 244 balls). The duo had kept the Indian bowlers at bay for 42.1 overs.
De Villiers, showing traits of the finest grafters in modern Test cricket, took the centre-stage after Amla’s dismissal and waged another grim battle for 35.1 overs in the company of Faf du Plessis, and then for 14.3 overs with Dane Vilas. He finally perished after the tea break, caught at leg slip by Jadeja off Ravichandran Ashwin for 43.
His herculean effort fell short of drawing the match, which looked quite possible till he was around. He may not have succeeded in saving the match, but his stupendous effort won him plaudits from the spectators, commentators and the Indian team. The huge appeal that de Villiers enjoys could be gauged from the fact that crowd kept chanting ‘ABD’ ‘ABD’ as he walked back to the pavilion after his dismissal.
Right through his knock, he avoided getting to the pitch of the ball, played most of the deliveries with soft hands to deny close-in fielders any chance. He waited for eternity before making any contact with the ball and moved around with amazing preciseness.
Umesh Yadav was the only bowler to give him some anxious moments – he hit him thrice on his hands. On two occasions, de Villiers lost control of his bat. Another delivery hit the unguarded part of his knee as he squirmed in pain. But he continued until Ashwin struck.
He brought back the memories of good old days of Test cricket with his stubborn knock. And it’s not the first time he has shown the other side of his batting– he played an epic innings against Australia in 2012 when he played out 220 balls for a 33 to save the Test.
Both the skippers had words of appreciation for him. While Virat Kohli felt it requires lot of skills to play like that, Amla said “he did an exceptional job to hold it together for us.”
